Club news

DARK DAYS AT DEPORTIVO

05 Dec 2014Convulsive times surrounding Deportivo. The pressure over the ultras across Spain is getting bigger, Depor’s board in the federation of peñas has resigned and even ex-president Lendoiro was fired from the LFP.

Javier Romero Taboada, aka ‘Jimmy’ was buried on Wednesday in A Coruña. His death is carrying repercussions that still hitting the Spanish football and especially Deportivo. The police already made the first arrests for the death of the Depor fan. According to newspaper El Mundo three brothers were arrested in Alcorcón (Madrid).

Two of them were identified by the cameras when they were hitting Jimmy, one of them have a police record for been involved with a radical extreme right group. According to newspaper El Confidencial they are among the most violent members of the Frente Atlético. Later, on Thursday, the home secretary of Spain, Jorge Fernández Díaz, told to reporters that the assassins haven’t been arrested yet.

Meanwhile, the pressure over all the ultras in Spain is reaching a peak. The highest authorities are pushing in order to expel the radicals from football, even clubs out of this polemic situation are taking measures, as example Sporting Gijón, club that was facilitating a room at their stadium to their radicals, the Ultra Boys. The pressure from the antiviolence committee forced the Asturian club to take away this privilege.

The highest sporting authority in the country is the president of the council for sports (CSD), Miguel Cardenal; he has been talking to several radios and newspapers, the speech is the same: the radicals and violent people must be expelled from football.

At Radio Marca he even said that the presidents of Atlético and Deportivo have been menaced by some radicals, ”We are asking to expel the criminals from the stadiums. They should be expelled and banned; this problem should be eradicated from Spanish football. We are ready to bring support and offer the resources to give protection to the people that need it, because these menaces cannot take place.” He said.

The attention has been focused in two things: how both groups –the Riazor Blues and the Frente Atlético- were at the Vicente Calderón without the police knowing anything and how the Riazor Blues got the tickets for the game.

About the first regard, it is clear that Depor’s officials informed the Galician police about a “small group” of Riazor Blues members attending to the game, and it’s now clear that the Police in Galicia informed their colleagues in Madrid about it. These facts were admitted by the home secretary of Spain, Jorge Fernández Díaz, ”The antiviolence commission should have been informed in order to declare a high-risk game. We are now studying what failed in this chain to stablish responsibilities.” He told to reporters.

The authorities investigate why there were no measures to prevent the incidents that led to the death of a person, and it has been now that there was a no meeting at all to analyze if this game should have been declared a high-risk game or not, this is an obligation for any football match in the country.

Meanwhile, the LFP and the RFEF are trying to send a strong message trying to separate football from the ultras. Javier Tebas, president of la liga, announced measures against the clubs that are still tolerating these groups. On Thursday he said that these clubs could face deduction of points and even the demotion.

This new “zero tolerance” policy is even affecting ex-president Augusto César Lendoiro, who was fired as ambassador of the LFP for attending to the funeral of Jimmy. The LFP and the RFEF are upset with the death of the fan, but also accuse him of been part of a violent group, so they have been avoiding any kind of tribute to his death and the attendance of Lendoiro was understood as a tribute. Deportivo even had to clarify that the minute of silence on Wednesday was a gesture against violence and not a tribute to Jimmy.

In the meantime the anti-violence committee fined €60,001 the 88 persons involved in the fight on last Sunday. They are also expelled from any stadium during a period of five years. A large group of these persons are members from the Riazor Blues.

People attending to the burial of Jimmy

Tribute to Jimmy outside the Riazor

There was a lot of police on Wednesday at the Riazor

Marathon Inferior was empty for the game against Málaga

The line at the Riazor on Thursday to get tickets for Saturday’s game

Deportivo is the side suffering the most with this situation. The developments are causing a bigger division of “usual war” between the supporters of Lendoiro and the ones of president Tino Fernández. First to all not all the fans agree that the best decision is to expel the Riazor Blues from the stadium, while others didn’t agree to see the stand closed (Marathon Inferior).

On Thursday the president conceded an interview to La Voz de Galicia and confirmed his intentions, ”The Riazor Blues won’t have any presence at the stands. I’m convinced that this is the end. What we did with the stands (closed for two games) are the first measures. Right now we don’t have official news on the incidents, so we cannot do anything else. This is a first step in a long way in which we aren’t alone, because this cannot be fixed with individual measures.”

The federation of peñas is also under fire as they have been accused for providing the tickets to the Riazor Blues ahead of the visit to Atlético Madrid. Normally the federation is the one that handles the petition of away tickets and negotiates with the club to later distribute them among the peñas.

President Fernández accused the federation of giving tickets to the Riazor Blues that were destined to the peñas, while they informed the club that this group wasn’t going to travel for this game. The federation reacted releasing a press release affirming that the club knew that they have sold tickets to the Riazor Blues, though they also admitted that some of the tickets destined to the peñas ended in the wrong hands, something they couldn’t explain.

The federation also explained that they no longer feel the confidence of the club, reason why its president, Miguel Otero, and the other members are presenting their resignation, which will take place at the end of the season.

All of this is causing an environment of confrontation and division that was already felt at the stadium. On Wednesday’s match in Copa the attendance was really poor and it was possible to hear whistles and chants against the president, while other side of the stadium was whistling against these protests.

It was a clear proof of the division and the worse could be yet to come. A new exam will be witnessed in the league match against the same rival to be played on Saturday, because the attendance will be bigger as the club is selling tickets at €1. Surely this is a dark moment for the club and one of the biggest tests for Tino Fernández. Something that he admitted during an interview at Radio Galega, ”We have a first degree challenge in a sporting sense, a first degree challenge in an economic sense and now a first degree challenge in a social regard.”